Amazon and Google just unveiled their biggest smart home gambit in over a decade. The tech giants launched Alexa Plus and Gemini for Home last week - completely rebuilt voice assistants powered by generative AI that can understand context and take actions. But after years of smart home disappointments, these AI upgrades face three critical hurdles that could make or break their success.
The smart home revolution just hit its biggest inflection point since Amazon and Google first introduced voice assistants over a decade ago. Both companies rolled out completely redesigned AI-powered assistants last week that promise to finally deliver on the elusive dream of ambient intelligence.
Amazon's Alexa Plus and Google's Gemini for Home represent a fundamental shift from the rigid command-and-control systems that have frustrated users for years. Built on large language models, these new assistants can understand context and natural language, potentially eliminating the need to remember exact device names or create complex automations.
The timing couldn't be more critical. Smart home adoption has essentially stalled because the technology remains too complicated and the value proposition unclear to most consumers. "The biggest gap we've had in the last decade is that intelligence layer," Google Home's Anish Kattukaran told reporters, explaining how the industry has relied on "hard-coding" and "if-this, then-that statements" until now.
For Google, the transformation begins with Gemini for Home rolling out this month across existing hardware and the new Google Home app. The assistant works best on the company's newest cameras and doorbells, along with an upcoming smart speaker. Meanwhile, Amazon's Alexa Plus, which has been in early access since March, is now shipping "out of the box" on the company's latest Echo devices.
The immediate benefits are already apparent to early testers. Instead of saying "turn on the kitchen lights," users can simply mention "I'm going to cook dinner, turn the lights on" from any room. Panos Panay, who leads Amazon's devices division, promises these upgrades will create "magically connected experiences" that transform how people interact with their homes.
But the road to ambient intelligence hits three major roadblocks that could derail these ambitious plans.
Reliability represents the first and most pressing challenge. Early Alexa Plus users report that previously reliable commands now fail or require new phrasing. "LLMs are great at being creative, but not so good at doing the same thing over and over again with the same predictable output," Kattukaran admits. The companies are essentially rebuilding a decade of smart home compatibility from scratch.
